“From Colonial Contexts”
Museums return remains to Hawaii
02/07/2022, 06:21 p.m
Thousands of human bones and skulls from almost all parts of the world are in German museums and universities. “Their return must be a priority,” says Minister of State for Culture Roth. Several facilities are now returning relics from Hawaii to their country of origin.
Human remains from several museums and universities in Germany and Austria will be handed over to the US state of Hawaii this week. The skulls and bones come from the collections of the Museum of Prehistory and Early History in Berlin, the Übersee-Museum in Bremen, the universities in Göttingen and Jena and the Natural History Museum in Vienna. A solemn ceremony for the handover of eight human skulls is planned for this Tuesday in Bremen.
Hawaii asked for the skulls to be returned in 2019. According to the Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation, the remains of 32 people will be handed over to the delegation of the Office of Hawaiian Affairs in Berlin on Friday. In between, stations in Göttingen and Jena are planned, following which there should be a handover in Vienna. “We recognize the anguish of our ancestors and take responsibility for their well-being (and therefore our own) by bringing them home for reburial,” delegation leader Edward Halealoha Ayau was quoted as saying in a statement.
Minister of State for Culture Claudia Roth said: “Human remains from colonial contexts have no place in our museums and universities, their return must be a priority”. Colonial history left many wounds. “We must do our part to ensure that these wounds can be closed – by returning them, by consistently coming to terms with and confronting our colonial past, and through greater international cultural exchange.”
Foundation President Hermann Parzinger announced that he would research the entire collection, which was taken over by the Charité in 2011, for further returns. In the case of Hawaii, this goal has already been achieved and a good solution has been found.
The historical anthropological collections in Berlin alone include around 7,700 human remains from almost all parts of the world. They were collected in the 19th and 20th centuries. About 40 percent have a colonial acquisition background from the former German overseas territories in Africa and the Pacific region.
